The conventional thought among people about social cause is doing charity to poor people. However, people are still ignorant about the meaning and the ultimate aim of social cause.
Social causes have a broad wing apart from charity. It can range from charity to cleaning up of rivers, lakes and beaches, spreading awareness related to social and environmental problems such as corruption, child labour, child marriage, usage of plastics etcetera. Volunteering for a social cause is very integral to our society as it helps in the betterment of our society. Volunteering should be made fun so that you feel every moment of the change, you as an individual is creating in a society and derive immense pleasure out of it. Let me highlight five points why you should volunteer for a social cause:
Good impact on health: It is a well-proven fact that if you volunteer for a social cause you can relieve stress and reduce blood pressure and stress-induced hypertension. It stalls the onset of Alzheimer’s and dementia. Can’t believe right? Yes, it’s true. It also interrupts tension-producing patterns and replaces them with a sense of positive emotions and feelings. Volunteering for a social cause can also increase your confidence level.
Unsustainable development goals: Instead of relying on the government to tackle all our social problems we can be a part of a volunteering team for a social cause and help in eradicating the problems sooner. Let’s take an example wherein the government had planned to clean up rivers and lakes by 2025 all over India and if individuals volunteer for cleaning up a few lakes and rivers in their own surroundings, the process would end sooner instead of relying only on the government to take measures to clean them up.
Real world experience: Apart from making volunteering fun, you also get a real-world experience if you work in the field. Conducting surveys, cleaning up animals and rivers, renovating old buildings, teaching underprivileged children, research work about a specific social problem, and spreading awareness about it are a few real-world experiences that can help develop various skills.
Make a change: Creating a change in someone’s life can give you immense happiness and peace. Just the thought can boost your self-confidence and feel proud of yourself. It is not very easy to make a change, but if you had done it is sure it would have given you the utmost satisfaction of contributing to the development of a better society. Know where your passion lies and dive deeper into creating a change you believe in. If your passion lies in teaching underprivileged children, gather some like-minded people and go to slums where the children don’t have enough guidance from parents for teaching. You have to research your passion, plan accordingly, and focus on executing the plan.
Gain different perspective: You tend to gain a different perspective when you start working towards a social cause. You look into the world differently and start to understand the actual seriousness of the problems. Your passion might also change, but the more you work on a social cause, the more you understand about the society you live in. You acquire leadership skills and other industry-related skills.
Every individual’s contribution to this society is important for society’s well being and prosperity. Instead of relying on the government for solving all the problems, individuals can volunteer for a social cause. There is no age bar for the individuals who volunteer. Teenagers and youth tend to have creative and innovative ideas towards eradicating the social problem. We should never be ignorant of volunteering because of our personal work. Even when you’re not available for volunteering you can give ideas and guidance to other volunteers. Volunteering for the social cause has lots of advantages to youth as they can connect more with people and can expand their contacts. All these sounds fun right? Teenagers and youth should enthuse towards working for a social cause. Mark and Cathy Delany hailing from Australia quit their well-paying jobs and came to relocate to Delhi slums. Initially, it was very difficult for the Delany family to learn Hindi, they started working in partnership with local NGO’s teaching poor kids. If an Australian family can come forward towards working for a social cause, why not us? Let’s all join hands and work for the betterment of our society.
This article has been written by Samyuktha. P, who volunteers with United Way Chennai. She is an engineering student from Chennai.
